(Zadar circa 1510–1563 Venice)
Vesta, Hymen, Mars and Venus – An Allegory of Marriage,
oil on panel, 92.5 x 126.5 cm, framed

Provenance:
sale, Semenzato, Rome, 26 October 1990, lot 13 (as Venetian School, 16th Century);
Private European collection

We are grateful to Mauro Lucco for endorsing the attribution of the present painting after examination in the original.

We are also grateful to Bernard Aikema for independently endorsing the attribution of the present painting after examination in the original.

The present unpublished painting is a significant addition to the oeuvre of Andrea Meldola, called ‘lo Schiavone’. The composition of flowing figures with diffused contours is an example of the artist’s production from the 1540s. Around this time, Pietro Aretino, one of the most influential poets and writers of his time, praised Schiavone’s ‘prestezza saputa’, his rapid virtuoso painting technique which made him a pioneer in a free handling of paint, which might have influenced Titian.

Schiavone’s early expressionistic brushwork is clearly apparent in the present painting, with areas of paint impasto, creating a dynamic fluidity. This is further enhanced by the deployment of colour, with contrasting red and green. The faces of Mars and Vesta, along with her braided hair and the serpentine-like hair decoration, are repeated in the depiction of Jupiter and a goddess in The Marriage of Cupid and Psyche, conserved in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (acc. no. 1973.116). The elaboration of the draperies and the vessel can be compared to The Adoration of the Magi in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Milan (inv. no. 198).

Compositionally, though inverted, the painting further relates to the depiction of the same subject by Titian in the Louvre, Paris (inv. no. 754), dated circa 1530–1535. Titian’s painting was traditionally thought to represent the departure of Alfonso d’Avalos, Marchese del Vasto, from his young wife Maria d’Aragona, who lowers her head in sadness. The other figures were believed to be Vesta, protectress of domestic peace, Cupid, already domesticated as he presents his bundle of arrows to the bride, and Hymen with a basket of flowers, the symbol of marriage (see H. E. Wethey, Titian. The Mythological & Historical Paintings, London 1975, p. 127). A more complex interpretation was Erwin Panofsky’s, who not only identified the protagonists as bride and groom, but also as Mars and Venus. The other female figure personifies ‘Marital Faith’ and the third figure lifting a basket, ‘Hope’ (see E. Panofsky, Studies in Iconology, New York 1939, pp. 160–166).

Unlike Titian’s painting, in the present composition, the female figure is not carrying a globe, but a vessel. In addition, her head is not lowered, but turned directly to the viewer. Traditionally, vessels or cups are associated with fertility. In Greek mythology, suffering and evil come to earth from Pandora’s box. More positively, the Song of Songs says of the heavenly bride: Your womb is a well-rounded cup. In the present composition, chosen by ‘lo Schiavone’ or his patrons, the female figure takes on a much more important role. In addition, this figure also reveals the influence of Francesco Salviati’s models on the young Schiavone.

Andrea Meldola, called lo Schiavone was born in the Venetian governed city of Zara in Dalmatia, now Zadar in Croatia, however, his family was originally from Meldola, a small town close to the city of Forlì in Romagna. By the late 1530s Schiavone seems to have been established in Venice, where he executed the present painting in the 1540s and by this time his Mannerist style of painting was fully developed.